The strategy behind DoorDash's sponsorship of esports tournament, League of Legends Circuit Oceania

Senior manager of consumer marketing for on-demand food delivery player talks through the sponsorship strategy and reasons for growing its esports footprint

DoorDash’s foray in the esports field is part of a sponsorship approach that sees the food delivery brand building presence and authenticity across community platforms its target customer groups are actively engaging in.  

DoorDash has become inaugural naming rights sponsor of the League of Legends Circuit Oceania (LCO), Australia and New Zealand’s largest esports league watched by more than 750,000 viewers in its first year. The 2021 partnership sees the brand integrated into all broadcasts and digital content, connecting the business with esport’s younger fans and participants.  

LCO was founded in 2021 and is organised by ESL Australia and Guinevere Capital. It replaced the former Oceanic Pro League hosted by Riot Games, which ran between 2015 and 2020. The current league has eight teams.    

DoorDash senior manager of consumer marketing for Australia, Michael McCash, told CMO the company’s US business has been upping investing into the online gaming community including partnerships with live streaming platform, Twitch. The ambition is to tap into a younger, tech-savvy cohort of consumers harder to reach through traditional media. He noted such consumers are often the ones running adblockers, consuming content differently, who show strong community orientation and want the most authentic of connection with brands.  

“It’s about being present on the platforms they are on to start to identify opportunities,” he said. “Gaming and on-demand delivery go perfectly together. DoorDash prides itself on its high-level convenience offering for food, groceries and alcohol - perfect for players and spectators that are often engrossed in long gaming sessions.”  

Having stepped up Australian investment 18 months ago, DoorDash this year began investigating ways to connect with younger consumers locally, commencing activities and paid TV executions with Pedestrian TV. Having chalked up strong results with gaming audiences, the decision was made to take that bigger step and invest in LCO.  

“Often in APAC, this space [esports] isn’t as developed or sophisticated in terms of marketing campaigns or working in this space,” McCash continued, making the inaugural LCO sponsorship too good an opportunity to miss.  

As part of the deal, DoorDash will be featured across the DoorDash LCO broadcast in new segments, including the DoorDash #sendit Replays, and Players That Delivered, activating during key moments of the twice-weekly broadcast. DoorDash will also integrate into the LCO’s social media channels, which boasted an audience of over 2 million users over its inaugural season.  

The esports sponsorship is distinctive to DoorDash’s significant sponsorship of the NRL. Announced in March, this deal sees the brand as official on-demand delivery partner with logos appearing in-goal across matching including the State of Origin. The company has also secured naming rights for Touch Football Australia, one of Australia’s fastest growing social sports.  

McCash again pointed to the desire to connect with target audiences in the channels and communities they’re engaged in.  

“We have been purposeful in what make up those typical audiences and how best to authentically connect with them,” he said. “With LCO versus NRL, it’s a very different approach – we are using different messaging, positioning and responding to distinct needs, and we have also led with different partners.  

“The NRL audience have a penchant for different sorts of food and options. We are quickly learning in esports that they use our food and service options quite differently. What they like and order, when they want food delivered and the preferred options are all distinctive. So our creative and tactics as well as channel optimisation are different.”    

In addition, the two games play in very different arenas: NRL is driven by mainstream TV broadcast and big physical stadiums, while LCO requires a more hands-on, digital approach, McCash said.  

To ensure relevance and connection with the esports audience, DoorDash is engaging in social monitoring and two-way conversations to show up in and around relevant moments. For McCash, the impetus is on being valued and respected, building brand credibility and goodwill.  

“We have team members actively part of Twitch channels for LCO, communicating with spectators and game members,” he said. “Our social team is replying via Twitter and in channels where things are being talked about.”    

While agreeing esports “can be a scary place for some brands”, McCash pointed to KitKat’s successful presence in the esports category in Europe through a similar sponsorship with the League of Legends European Championship as a standout example of the pay-off for brands integrating in this space. KitKat confirmed it was expanding its sponsorship in June thanks to its success to date.  

“This space requires a higher-touch approach than traditional media but there’s more immediate response,” McCash said.    

And even with the distinctions between the NRL and LCO sponsorships in terms of audience, McCash said core metrics, desired outcomes and level of risk across both sponsorships is similar. Key ambitions for DoorDash are customer acquisition, retention and providing services consumers want in order to be their preferred food delivery provider.  

“We did weigh up this LCO sponsorship in terms of brand safety and it’s not necessarily riskier than our other work,” he commented. “It’s the same for most sponsorships and no more or less risky than other growth opportunities. It just requires a different approach and level of executive discussion and tactics to show up authentically.”    

Helping DoorDash capitalise on the opportunity is a fast-paced operational way of working, which McCash said “lends itself to us being able to take these opportunities and running with them quickly”. He said adaptability is a skill other brands also have to work towards.    

Test-and-learn principles will be in play as DoorDash engages across Twitch, via video, site takeovers then the stream itself in direct response activities to engage in specific moments.

Other next steps include moving to more of an influencer approach, integrating with players, spectators and members.  

“We are elated to be partnering with DoorDash. They’ve been greatly supportive of our vision for the league and I’m excited to see what we can do together in both the short and long term.” said head of commercial for the DoorDash LCO, Graeme Du Toit. “Convenience is critically important for our audience, and we’re looking forward to leveraging DoorDash to improve the LCO experience for our fans. Hopefully that spills over into DoorDash making their lives more convenient outside of match days too.”  

Don’t miss out on the wealth of insight and content provided by CMO A/NZ and sign up to our weekly CMO Digest newsletters and information services here. 

You can also follow CMO on Twitter: @CMOAustralia, take part in the CMO conversation on LinkedIn: CMO ANZ, follow our regular updates via CMO Australia's Linkedin company page

 

 

 

Join the newsletter!

Or

Sign up to gain exclusive access to email subscriptions, event invitations, competitions, giveaways, and much more.

Membership is free, and your security and privacy remain protected. View our privacy policy before signing up.

Error: Please check your email address.
Show Comments

Latest Videos

More Videos

More Brand Posts

What are Chris Riddell's qualifications to talk about technology? What are the awards that Chris Riddell has won? I cannot seem to find ...

Tareq

Digital disruption isn’t disruption anymore: Why it’s time to refocus your business

Read more

Enterprisetalk

Mark

CMO's top 10 martech stories for the week - 9 June

Read more

Great e-commerce article!

Vadim Frost

CMO’s State of CX Leadership 2022 report finds the CX striving to align to business outcomes

Read more

Are you searching something related to Lottery and Lottery App then Agnito Technologies can be a help for you Agnito comes out as a true ...

jackson13

The Lottery Office CEO details journey into next-gen cross-channel campaign orchestration

Read more

Thorough testing and quality assurance are required for a bug-free Lottery Platform. I'm looking forward to dependability.

Ella Hall

The Lottery Office CEO details journey into next-gen cross-channel campaign orchestration

Read more

Blog Posts

Marketing prowess versus the enigma of the metaverse

Flash back to the classic film, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Television-obsessed Mike insists on becoming the first person to be ‘sent by Wonkavision’, dematerialising on one end, pixel by pixel, and materialising in another space. His cinematic dreams are realised thanks to rash decisions as he is shrunken down to fit the digital universe, followed by a trip to the taffy puller to return to normal size.

Liz Miller

VP, Constellation Research

Why Excellent Leadership Begins with Vertical Growth

Why is it there is no shortage of leadership development materials, yet outstanding leadership is so rare? Despite having access to so many leadership principles, tools, systems and processes, why is it so hard to develop and improve as a leader?

Michael Bunting

Author, leadership expert

More than money talks in sports sponsorship

As a nation united by sport, brands are beginning to learn money alone won’t talk without aligned values and action. If recent events with major leagues and their players have shown us anything, it’s the next generation of athletes are standing by what they believe in – and they won’t let their values be superseded by money.

Simone Waugh

Managing Director, Publicis Queensland

Sign in